Ludhiana, July 2
As the tussle continues between Baba Farid University of Health Sciences (BFU) on the one side and the management of Christian Medical College and Hospital (CMCH) on the other over the holding of pre-medical entrance test (PMT) for admission to MBBS and BDS courses as well as distribution of seats, CMCH has fixed July 18 for the holding the examination on its own.
The state government had issued a notification that a common PMT would be held by BFU for all private and government medical and dental colleges and that institutions run by the minority communities (Sikhs and Christians) would have to fill 50 per cent of total seats on the basis of open merit while the other 50 per cent could be offered to candidates belonging to the minority community.
However, the CMCH management refused to give up its claim on holding its own PMT to fill seats for the MBBS and BDS courses, citing a ruling of the apex court that those minority institutions, which were holding their separate entrance tests for the past more than 25 years, could continue to do so.
Dr Mohan Verghese, Principal, , CMCH told Ludhiana Tribune today that there was nothing in the way of holding PMT by the college to fill seats on the all- India merit, both for open category and the candidates belonging to the minority community. The issue as to how many seats CMCH would have to provide to candidates based on open merit or whether the open merit seats were to be filled from among candidates qualifying in the common PMT or that of the CMCH was before the committee headed by Justice G.R. Majithia ( retd) .
"We have held a couple of rounds of discussions with Justice Majithia and are quite hopeful of a positive outcome in the next few days, ”he said. Meanwhile, the United Church of Northern India (UCNI) has come out in the open, saying the CMCH need not conduct separate entrance test. An authorised spokesperson for the UCNI, Mr B.M. Frederick, said in a statement that the separate entrance test conducted by the CMCH on all -India basis, in fact, did not serve the desired purpose of providing admission to deserving Christian candidates and the situation was being exploited by certain select bishops or Christian institutions, who were empowered by the managing committee of the CMCH to nominate 22 candidates. "Among themselves, these bishops or Christian bodies nominate between one and three candidates each and there is practically little or no competition for sponsored seats."
Mr Frederick further alleged that there had been instances when the non-Christian candidates, shown to be Christians, had been nominated to sponsored seats. The selective sponsorship system, he maintained, was unfair even to the Christian candidates, most of whom did not have access to the influential bishops or functionaries of authorised Christian bodies.
